


Birds at a Lighthouse

by gardnerhill



Series: Egg Hunt [6]
Category: The Great Mouse Detective (1986)
Genre: Blood, Community: watsons_woes, Harm to Animals, M/M, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:55:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25418797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gardnerhill/pseuds/gardnerhill
Summary: Going out without your Boswell never ends well.
Relationships: Basil of Baker Street/David Dawson
Series: Egg Hunt [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/137172
Comments: 2
Kudos: 20
Collections: Watson's Woes JWP Collection: 2020





	Birds at a Lighthouse

**Author's Note:**

> For the 2020 July Watson's Woes Promptfest prompt #20, **How To Train Your Cormorant:** Watson and Holmes deal with a predatory seabird, or some other trained animal (cf. VEIL.)

"Why keep me? You don't eat mice."

"I have my orders."

Basil nodded. "Ah. You were offered the right amount of fresh fish."

Reginald didn't even look at his bound captive. "I have my orders."

This wasn't a matter of cutting a few cords. Basil was enwrapped chin to tail in one enormous webbed foot like a straightjacket. Both stood atop a lighthouse in a harbour surrounded by sheer chalky cliffs, still sending its beams out in the dark just before dawn, warning away the ships that were darker specks out on the dark water. Escaping from this enemy's very literal grip would mean a long plummet to the icy black sea, teeming with fish big enough to eat the pikes that prowled the Thames let alone an escaped mouse.

This Beachy Head business had taken a nasty turn.

Perhaps Basil should have awakened Dawson when he got that midnight summons and left their inn, but the dear fellow would have tried to talk him out of it. …Well, it seems he would have had a point. Basil had barely made it to the other white beacon-house atop the cliff when a snap from behind had hoisted him to dangle between two turquoise-eyed fisher birds. One cormorant had flapped off to carry the word to someone called "Fitzwilliam," and Reginald had taken his prey to the sealocked lighthouse.

"I do have a bit of a criminal record myself, you know." Basil smiled. "Were you hired by the gulls whose eggs I stole?" A second later he was upright and facing expressionless glittering eyes at the end of a long sharp bill.

"Don't _ever_ mention those cowardly garbage-eaters and my family in the same breath again." The hook-tipped bill snapped shut so near to Basil's face he felt the wind of it on his left eye. "You only have to be alive when Fitzwilliam arrives. Not necessarily in one piece." And down Basil went again, with the same gut-churning speed.

So Reggie – Reginald – and his family were touchy about that, were they? That meant such birds wouldn't take just any criminal job. This must be something big and posh, not just poaching someone's fishing spot. Human and rodential smugglers had worked these shores since prehistoric days, luring ships to the rocks and scavenging their goods. Jewelry or other small high-value items could be easily swallowed by a long-necked diving bird and coughed back up in a treasure room for an enterprising crime boss. A wealthy fellow would invest by offering better and more fish to such posh thieves than they could catch on their own.

The east was a thin red line on the horizon when familiar choruses of screeching and screaming converged around the fishing boats dotted across the harbour and trailing a bigger cargo ship. Reginald turned his head away from the spectacle of the flapping white wings.

"Reginald!" Two black birds, one much bigger than the other, flapped toward them from the land. Basil stared at the figures illuminated in the building's floodlight for a moment. That was no cormorant. Oh, this explained much.

The other cormorant perched on the edge of the small round roof atop their tower. The big black raven alit on the weathervane at the very top. "Reginald." Its voice was as deep as a foghorn. "Charlemagne told me of your find. You still have him. Well done."

"It was exactly as you said, Sir Fitzwilliam." Reginald's plummy tones now sounded like a grovelling courtier seeking favour with a brutal king. "Exactly."

"Dangle a mysterious message like a baited hook." Charlemagne, the second cormorant, laughed. "We are the best fish-catchers, aren't we!"

"You are out of place here, mouse." Anger under that elegant tone. Sir Fitzwilliam cocked his head and fixed Basil with a cold glare. "Did you think you could stop my operation? You should have stayed in London catching pickpockets."

"Jewelry, isn't it?" Basil made himself sound as bored and contemptuous as he could; the latter part was easy. "Have your waterfowl blot out the lighthouse when the right ships come along, they run aground, and your henchbirds can gobble up wealth and spit it out at your feet. Shiny things. You ravens can be so predictable."

"Jewelry buys other _ravens_ , you small-minded little rat!" Fitzwilliam drew himself up furiously, feathers ruffled at the insult. "Those Tower fools think they run our parliament now. But I'll soon have enough influence to start giving them orders." The other two birds bobbed their heads.

Now it all made sense – the politician, the lighthouse, the trained cormorant. Fitzwilliam was egotistical enough to demand an audience with his victim first. The only question was how Basil would be silenced; pecked to death, thrown to his death, drowned, eaten by a tuna…

The screaming and screeching grew louder, the sound closer. They were heading for the lighthouse. Basil's heart lifted.

"There's always a few young idiots in a gull flock looking for rubbish here." The raven looked at the flapping, screaming birds approaching them, and at the mouse in the cormorant's grip. "Let's indulge them, Reginald."

BANG.

Basil felt the impact of the gunshot in the bird holding him as Reginald screamed and let go of his captive, one wing flapping and one dangling. Basil slid and skidded and gripped the edge of the small pointed roof.

"What the devil!" roared Sir Fitzwilliam.

The gulls swooped over the top of the lighthouse, screaming their perpetual hunger-cry "Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine!" with an addition.

"BASIL!"

One young bird banked round the lighthouse roof. A stout mouse sat on her back, aiming his Army revolver once again.

BANG.

Basil was sprinkled with blood and black feathers as the screaming Charlemagne, bill open to seize Basil, staggered back and plummeted toward the sea.

"Back! Back, you filthy wretches!" Fitzwilliam bellowed at the squad of gulls surrounded the big black bird, hopping and pecking at him. He flew into the air, cawing furiously.

With his captors wounded or preoccupied, Basil was able to stagger to his feet just as the young gull perched on the roof. Dawson reached down a paw to help his friend onto the white feathery back.

When Basil was settled behind him, Dawson drew a bead on Sir Fitzwilliam. "One more shot, I think."

Basil rested a paw on his friend's shoulder. "You might hit one of my rescuers. And I have enough information to bring back to London and pass along to the Tower." Those canny birds would be ready long before Fitzwilliam was – and would send along their own operatives. Fitzwilliam would only wish he'd been pecked to death by gulls or shot by a mouse.

The gull hopped off and away they flew toward the shore, leaving the others to mob the lighthouse. "You awright mouse?" she called.

"Yes! Thanks to both of you." Basil patted Dawson's shoulder.

"Then that's awright. Mum and Maw send their love."

Of course. Basil grinned. "You're Elsie! Alice and Gertie's girl."

"Yeh. Bennie's still in London and Charlie's down to Cornwall. My mates are givin' that posh plucker what-for. Train station?"

"Inn first. We need our bags. Our work here is done."

When the young hen-gull landed near the mousehole inn, Basil dismounted and reached up to help Dawson down. His smile froze when he saw the look the other gave him.

Dawson got off Elsie's back.

"Dawson, I owe you –"

"I found your footprints, near those of webbed feet." Dawson's voice was carved from ice. "I called for help from the local gulls. It's a good thing they have a far range and love to gossip. They knew about us and Elsie was just up the coast. I was able to assemble a raiding party and get you back. Which would _not_ have been necessary if you'd let me in on your plans!"

Basil had angrily dressed down Dawson after being terrified for his life after he'd done a very foolish thing. It was his turn now, so he said nothing.

Dawson grunted, and turned toward the doorway. "We might be able to catch the 6:15 to Paddington if we hurry packing and checking out. This isn't over, Basil. But let's wait until we're safe, fed and rested."

A wise mouse, his mate – as well as being brave, daring and resourceful, and a deucedly-good shot. Basil followed him into the inn to settle their account. Not including Dawson in the plans had been idiotic indeed, and a mistake Basil would not make in the future.

There were only so many gulls in England who owed him a favour, after all.


End file.
